Networking for good

In the midst of the social-networking-for-a-cause flurry, I'm doing my best to evaluate all these sites. There was a great article in the San Francisco Chronicle over the weekend about the somewhat inspiring origins of these start-ups.

The online grassroots trend has taken some by surprise. Silicon Valley hasn't always been known for its largesse. Sharing the wealth with the less fortunate usually means issuing more stock options to employees. And the Web 2.0 generation, with its YouTube and Twitter mania, has gotten a particularly bad rap for self-obsession and indulgence.

But social activism is rising among entrepreneurs who are using ambition, creativity and daring to fuse their personal values and career goals.

I plan to at least give all of these sites a shot. I've been registered on Change.org (not mentioned in the article) for a couple months, but I haven't found myself visiting it much. In other words, I'm still trying to find a reason to visit it. There are some good debates and you can download a fundraising widget (probably much like ChipIn), and the tag cloud on the homepage is a cool indicator of "hot causes." You can make your own like mine:

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